Nursery World Awards 2021 - Nanny of the Year

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A live-in nanny based in London, Georgia often works more than 12 hours a day to care for her three charges, aged between six and 12.

Georgia often goes above and beyond the role of nanny, and did so in particular during the Covid-19 pandemic.

During all the lockdowns, Georgia sacrificed her trips home on her days off in order to avoid mixing households and to ensure she kept her employer’s family safe. This meant she sometimes went for months at a time without seeing her partner, friends or family.

During lockdown, Georgia’s employer became a lone parent, which was a difficult transition for the whole family, and one of the children needed particular support adapting to the changes. The entire family relied on Georgia throughout this challenging time for her calm and stabilising influence.

Happily working several hours of overtime every week, Georgia was integral in supporting the children’s mental and emotional well-being through these challenging circumstances, ensuring they always felt happy, safe and loved. She helped them to navigate a variety of new feelings during this period, seek reassurance and find a way of constructively communicating their confusion and anger.

As the children Georgia cares for are of different ages, they are each at different stages of development, have different characters, interests and needs, and therefore pose individual challenges, all of which require positive responses from Georgia to ensure all three children thrive.

When the pandemic struck and schools were closed, Georgia was tasked with ensuring all three children received high-quality, full-time home education. Luckily, she adapted rapidly and efficiently to working with teachers to understand what was required, and juggling lesson times for each of her charges.

While her role changed significantly during this time, Georgia relished the challenge, particularly enjoying having the children at home more, the less structured days, and seeing the children spend more time in each other’s company.

She had to become more creative with the children’s free time as there was less for them to do outside of the home. Extra-curricular classes and activities were no longer running, so cooking, crafting, time in the garden, long walks, cycle rides and nature trails became a big part of their time together, and Georgia helped to make these activities enjoyable and productive for all the children.

Throughout these difficult times, Georgia also managed to maintain a fantastic relationship with her employer, providing support without ever blurring the line between professional and personal.

The judges felt Georgia’s passion for her role as a nanny came shining through. She was able to demonstrate her emotional intelligence and commitment to her role with aplomb. She is an excellent advocate for her charges and understands their individual needs, has good knowledge of her industry and the external support and opportunities available, and is dedicated to ensuring her own professional development benefits her clients as well as herself.

FINALISTS

Kelly Bowman

Amy Hensman

CRITERION

Open to any qualified or experienced nanny (minimum five years’ experience if not qualified)

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